Our ‘meeting’ began with our decision to move away from the very regional compulsion of a grand view (of the Rocky Mountains), and instead acknowledge the everyday rhythms of this immigrant neighborhood in Aurora CO. The resulting architectural expression was not some metaphoric sense of openness (where everything revealed at once) conveyed through a thin pane of glass, but a careful working with fragments, and the building holding these within itself — making vignettes of an alley, the sky , a telegraph pole, a mural , a lone maple tree. Facades also become containers; outdoor rooms within the larger outdoor of the neighborhood….active during the day, and as we have noticed, occasionally a lit refuge for the neighborhood homeless.

A welcoming architecture, should such extensions be required, in a world where cities are becoming increasingly hostile.